The year was 1977. It was summer. It was hot. The place, Roosevelt Island, Washington DC. Little Mumble....how cute she was...all bashful that someone would see her little boobies that weren’t. A family friend offered her his tube sock. She shot imaginary bows with her imaginary arrows while in her ruffled underpants...Those were the days. Maybe this is why she still has an addiction to tube socks.... errr...on her feet.
The year....still 1977. The month....April. Little Mumble is now 2 years old. Poor Mumble, it seems every year she is sick on her birthday and thus celebrates alone. So says her mother. Truth is, she might not have had any friends. Poor little girl. Her mommy baked her a cake. She tried effortlessly to blow the candles out. If you could see the other photos taken of the event, you would see how hard she tried. But finally her efforts did pay off, and she blew the two single candles out. She clutched her Curious George doll and smiled with glee. The same Curious George that she eventually threw over the balcony at the kids miles below. They told her they'd give it back..."start throwing your toys down", they hollered. And little Mumble did. The last to go over was Curious George before her mommy stopped her. She never got her toys back. Naïve little Mumble....
The year is STILL 1977...but now little Mumble has gotten a little tougher. After losing a handful of toys to those no good kids, she wasn't about to take any more shit. "Don't fuck with me", she said "and gimme ma cookie!!" She had become a rebel now, in her few years of age. She paced the balcony of her penthouse apartment with her red tricycle....thinking of how she could take revenge on the little bastards that did her wrong. .... their day would come....their day would come......she grumbled...
Fastforward to 1979. Its winter and little Mumble is a few years older now. 4 to be exact. She has no more time for the losers downstairs and she's been dragged down by her mother...forced to pose, yet again, next to a snowman. Being a model is such boring work. Ho-Hum.... she's contemplating stomping the snowman to bits...
The losers in Virginia have been long forgotten. It's now 1983 and Mumble has moved on to Bangladesh, worlds away. 8 years old and she think she is the bomb. Somehow, she is convinced that the one piece, short shorts summer outfit is hot. She poses in the front yard with her clogs and her jelly ankle braclet. She think she is cool.
Easter 1983. The fashion police must have missed her block. Mumbles doesn't want to be sitting there on this...what is this...Easter Bunny? Is the idea to freak out the little kids? Looks like he's ready to molest someone. Check Mumbles face...you know she's thinking about bashing his face in...Nice tennis shoes bunny.
It's still 1983...a few months later and her hair has grown out. She still thinks she's a badass...probably more than before. Here she poses with another little girl in their grass outfits. Mumbles is most obviously better. Look at how they drink their Coca Colas.... hell yeah...its gonna be a great year.... Don't mess with me. Remember the little girl on the red tricycle. Remember The Omen...and I got tassles on my sleeves mother fuckers.....
I was born in Israel...and we left there when I was one and returned to Virginia. Parents split up around that time and so mom and I lived in the apartment building where the devil came out of me after the Curious George incident. Left when I was in first grade and moved to Bangladesh for 2 years. Yes. I remember most of it. Back then it was really very undeveloped. One of the poorest countries in the world at the time. My school, American International School/Dhaka, was located smack in the middle of a dirt field...nothing around it but dry, dry dirt and oxen. School was KG- 8th grade at the time. Anyone older had to go to boarding school somewhere else. Switzerland maybe. Life was great. No TV, outside playing all the time. Summer all the time. The main location of entertainment and socialization was the American Club. Most of us lived there during our free time...swimming, playing, eating... 2 years later we move to New Delhi, India. A step up as far as development. We lived in an American compound..full of townhouses for the American Embassy staff and their families. Out the backdoor of the compound was the American Embassy School, and out the front gates was the American Embassy....that street was like Embassy row...a bunch of other Embassies were lined along there too. Life was still good and it was safe for us kids to play outside, being that we were in the compound. The American Club was within the grounds too. In the back of the compound was another little compound for all the servants of the families that lived there. It was pretty amazing to go to. Sometimes the maids would take us kids there to their homes. It was basically a huge apartment complex...a kind of little India, within America, within India. In India, was the last time I bowled too. One night, the school had a play or something going on and I was there with my friend Amalee. There were two boys there from my class. Mik and Sebastian. Cute boys. We played tag with mouthfuls of water. Spit on someone and they are tagged. I was spat on. On my head. Dreamy. I didn't wash my hair all nite.....Next stop, Jakarta, Indonesia for 2 years. Lived in another compound here. Every Wednesday was either late start, or early release day from school. Late start was great cause us kids would go to the American Club, order Oreo Freezes and slurp those down before heading off to school. Early release days we'd have some school activity to participate in, then go home and jump in the pool. My backyard gate opened out to the deep end. I could literally open the gate and jump in. This was also about the time I developed hives from extreme temperatures. Too cold and i'd break out in hives all along my joints. I'd have to sit in a hot tub to calm it down. Oddly enough, when I moved back here to the States, it flipped to very hot weather doing the same thing to me...not the cold anymore. Something to do with histamine...So anyways, Indonesia was great... loved it. Next, we moved to Taiwan for 5 years. Initially it was going to be for 3..but then by the time we were supposed to leave I was in 10th grade an my options were to move back to the States or to stay there. I asked my mom if we could stay put so I could finish H.S. where I started. Going back to the States to go to school, somewhere that I had hardly lived in my whole life, would be too much for me. I had some of the best times of my life in Taiwan......I am what you call a Trans Global Nomad. The world is my home.... The world is mine.
Now its way too many years later. I'm a mom, I own property, I have bills, I pay taxes and watch Curious George on TV with my son every morning while barking, crawling on my hands and knees, meowing, growling or whatever cracks him up. When did life change? Overnight. Aside from hitting the lottery big, I have plans of finding a time machine. I guess soon enough though I"ll be back out in the yard, running and playing carefree - except this time I'll be gasping for breath while chasing after my overly energetic toddler...
